The P Slate: Top down

Got it done just in time... except for today's early voters.  Those people had their minds made up anyway.  First, let's note -- and follow -- the advice of the Waco Herald Tribune's editorial board.

While the Trib has elected not to make candidate endorsements in the 2014 general election, we do have three recommendations: If you’re registered to vote, then do so — but only if you’re informed, which is our second recommendation. If you have not studied the candidates and the issues, take time to learn about both or do this republic a favor and just skip the electoral process.

Finally, only a putz votes straight-ticket. We haven’t seen a slate of party candidates yet, Republican or Democrat, that didn’t have some turkeys on it. And if you think voting straight-ticket ensures that one party’s nominees meet certain qualities, think again. Right here in McLennan County, we’ve seen straight-ticket voting put some absolutely incompetent people into offices of responsibility. When that happens, you’re to blame because you voted for them out of party loyalty, not merit or civic regard.

That is so perfect.  You can find some red and blue in the picks at Texpatriate, a mostly blue slate at Texas Leftist and nonsequiteuse, and a mostly Green one at Socratic Gadfly.

Congress

US Senate: Emily "Spicy Brown" Sanchez, Green.  Sorry Democrats, but I can't vote for a pro-life Catholic who also financially supports pregnancy crisis centers in his hometown.  David Alameel has also admitted that this year is a test run for a bid against Ted Cruz in 2018.  No freaking thanks.

Sanchez spoke via Sype to Harris County Greens at their candidate forum in September and made a surpise appearance at the season's fundraiser for her ticketmates, Kenneth Kendrick (Ag Commissioner) and Martina Salinas (Railroad Commissioner).  She made an instant impression talking to both groups.  She's committed and earnest.  She represents the future of Texas Greens: hard-working middle class people with a sense of justice, which is to say a proper outrage at injustices.  I am delighted to be counted a supporter.

US House of Representatives (in my case, the Seventh Congressional District).  Everybody already knows how I feel about this race.  Nothing has changed.  I think I'm going to vote for the Libertarian as a the best protest to John Culberson that can be mustered.

In other districts in the Houston area, Mark Roberts in CD-2 (G) and Niko Letsos (D) have run low-profile campaigns against the incumbent, Ted Poe.  They're both worthy alternatives.  (Neil and I wrote more extensively about Roberts in his first bid for this office two years ago.)  In CD-18, Green Remington Alessi's campaign against Sheila Jackson Lee, similarly, hasn't reached the level of his bid for Harris County Sheriff two years ago.  Democrat Tawana Cadien's second shot at ousting Rep. Michael McCaul in CD-10 is likewise under the radar.  And in CD-22, Democrat Frank Briscoe tests the Fort Bend County waters to see if they're purple enough yet to wash out the incumbent Repub, Pete Olson.

In Southeast Texas, the race to replace Steve Stockman in CD-36 has Libertarian-turned-Democrat Michael Cole of Orange and Green Hal J. Ridley Jr. of Bridge City bidding to upset the prohibitively favored Republican, Brian Babin of Woodville.  Ridley's been invisible; Cole was interviewed on Daily Kos, here.  In CD-14, incumbent Randy Weber of Pearland, really growing into his Tea Freak clothes, has Democratic challenger Donald Brown of Beaumont to fend off.  Brown has the HLGBT Caucus stamp of approval.

In other urban areas of Texas, there's a Green candidate running where no Democrat is, in CD-21 (Antonio Diaz versus Lamar Smith) and where no Republican is, in CD-28 (Michael Cary against Henry Cuellar).  So progressives in San Antonio and the RGV have options.  And in the Metroplex, Democrat David Cozad has run a spirited campaign against Smokey Joe Barton.

But short of something that is equal parts unforeseeable and miraculous, the only contested Congressional race in the Lone Star State is between Congressman Pete Gallego and GOPer Will Hurd in the far west Texas district that stretches from Big Bend to El Paso.  Gallego was once pretty progressive when in the statehouse in Austin, but he's moderated quite bit to hang on to his Congressional seat.  Still, we need no more Republicans in Congress, and Gallego should be returned to Washington.

The statewide executive offices and high courts

Governor: Wendy Davis.  Big surprise, huh?  I and everyone else have written enough about this race that the choice is as obvious as can be.

Lt. Governor: Leticia Van de Putte.  I wanted to find a reason to support Chandra Courtney; she and her husband David (also a Green candidate running for SD-17) are solid people, but the urgency to avoid having Lonesome Rhodes Dan Patrick elected to the state's most powerful position is just too great.  I'm voting for VDP and hoping enough moderate Republicans have come to their senses that we can avoid an apocalypse.

Attorney General: Sam Houston.  Every newspaper in the state of Texas isn't wrong.

Comptroller of Public Accounts:  Mike Collier.  Though I consider Deb Shafto one of my friends, and as Gadfly has pointed out, Collier says all the wrong things in trying to attract conservatives and moderate independents, it is just too dangerous for Texas to risk electing Jethro Bodine to statewide office.

Agriculture Commissioner: Kenneth Kendrick.  It was easy enough to scratch Sid Miller Archie Bunker and Jim Hogan Junior Samples, but Kendrick would have stood above the crowd even if the Republicans and Democrats had managed to nominate respectable candidates.  As the whistleblower in the Peanut Corporation of America killings, no one has done more for Texans already in the cause of social justice.  And unless you smoke a whole lot of dope, there's no coherent excuse for voting for the Libertarian, either. (Kendrick supports decriminalization as well.)

Kendrick is by far the best reason on the ballot for both Democrats and Republicans to split their straight tickets.

Land Commissioner: John Cook.  Here I also gave serious consideration to Valerie Alessi (married to Remington).  Alessi was nominated at the Green Party's state convention in March to replace another candidate who withdrew.  Except for some good responses to questions posed in the Houston League of Women Voters Guide, Alessi's campaign has been low-profile.  Cook was a progressive mayor of El Paso and gets my support.  Please, no more Bushes.

Texas Railroad Commission: Steve Brown (D) or Martina Salinas (G).  Honestly, I still can't choose between them.  They're both as good as it gets for their respective parties.

Texas Supreme Court, Place 1: Bill Moody (D).  Incumbent Republican Nathan Hecht remains under a cloud of ethical violations.  Republicans: your best choice in this race is the Libertarian, Tom Oxford.

Texas Supreme Court, Place 6: Lawrence Meyers.  The state's longest-serving Court of Criminal Appeals judge, Meyers switched parties and became a Democrat last year to bid for the SCOTX against Rick Perry appointee Jeff Brown.

Texas Supreme Court, Place 7:  Gina Benavides (D).  Serving the 13th Court of Appeals since 2006, Benavides has earned some endorsements over the incumbent Republican, Jeff Boyd.  Charles Waterbury of the Green Party is also well-qualified for this office.

Texas Supreme Court, Place 8: Jim Chisholm (G).  No Democrat ran for this seat on the state's highest court, and Democrats that fail to split their straight tickets will miss an opportunity to vote for this very qualified, progressive jurist.

Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, Place 3:  Bert Richardson (R), John Granberg (D), or Mark Bennett (L).  Richardson, as regular readers here will already know, is the judge who appointed the special prosecutor that brought felony indictments against Rick Perry.  Normally I might vote for the Democrat, Granberg, but he is young and unseasoned.  Bennett is a blogger and local lawyer I have crossed paths with.

I might flip a coin.  Or this might be the only Republican I vote for.

Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, Place 4: Judith Sanders Castro (G).

Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, Place 9: George Altgelt (G).

There's no Democratic candidate in either of these two races.  If you're voting a straight D ticket, you're leaving a lot of votes blank.  As the WHT said at the top... don't be a putz.

Harris County races to come will have to wait until later.

Early Voting Wrangle

"Voting freshens your breath, whitens your teeth, and improves your sex life." -- Molly Ivins

It may even make you immune to Ebola, I've heard.  But only if you are not a Republican.  In which case... you're catching that shit for sure.  The Texas Progressive Alliance reminds you that EARLY VOTING HAS BEGUN as it brings you this week's roundup.

Off the Kuff published an interview with John Cook, the Democratic nominee for Land Commissioner.

Libby Shaw, writing for Texas Kaos and Daily Kos is sickened by the "corporations are people" Supreme Court for allowing Greg Abbott to disenfranchise 600,000 Texans of their right to vote: TXGOP, Greg Abbott stand by discrimination and disenfranchisement.

Two special days in the blogosphere last week: Blog Action Day for inequality was a global initiative, and Texas blogs dropped a money bomb for Wendy Davis. PDiddie at Brains Eggs has details on both.

After this week's big announcement, Texas Leftist is left to wonder... Did the Dallas Morning News editorial board incorporate facts into its endorsement process for governor? If so, maybe this week's decision for Greg Abbott would have gone the other way. Clearly the DMN ed board should've taken a few minutes to read their own paper.

Republican racism revealed in TWIA emails about storm damage to Brownsville ISD property. CouldBeTrue of South Texas Chisme encourages everyone in South Texas to go vote. You can stop the racism. VOTE!

From WCNews at Eye on Williamson had two campaign ads worth checking out: Must See TV - Great Ads from Mike Collier and Sam Houston.

Neil at All People Have Value wrote about things he is doing to make a difference in the 2014 elections in Texas. Neil says you can make a difference as well. APHV is one of many interesting things to see at NeilAquino.com.

Texpatriate mixes it up with their endorsements in statewide races: George P. Bush for land commissioner, Sam Houston for Attorney General, and Mike Collier for Comptroller.

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And here are some posts of interest from other Texas blogs.

nonsequiteuse has her voting recommendations, which include a Green for agriculture commissioner.

Dan Solomon speaks from personal experience when he says that the Wendy Davis wheelchair ad shines a long-overdue light on the devastating effect tort "reform" has had on victims of medical malpractice.

The Inanity of Sanity has Part II of 'Abbott Disses the Disabled'.

The Lunch Tray keeps fighting the fight for healthier school lunches and snacks.

Grits for Breakfast calls on Texas jails to opt out of the Secure Communities program.

Texas Vox documents the big heat waves of 2013.

Socratic Gadfly was pleasantly surprised by the SCOTUS ruling that overturned the Fifth Circuit order allowing HB2 to go into effect pending appeals.

Helen Philpot would like for someone to explain to Greg Abbott where babies come from.

LGBTQ Insider compares Wendy Davis and Greg Abbott's positions on LGBTQ issues.

Andrea Grimes has the GIF-based explanation of the HB2 timeline that you've been waiting for.

Sunday Funnies

SCOTUS says use your ID, and other election developments

The last word for now (meaning this election).

The Supreme Court said Saturday that Texas can use its controversial new voter identification law for the November election.

A majority of the justices rejected an emergency request from the Justice Department and civil rights groups to prohibit the state from requiring voters to produce certain forms of photo identification in order to cast ballots. Three justices dissented.

The law was struck down by a federal judge last week, but a federal appeals court had put that ruling on hold. The judge found that roughly 600,000 voters, many of them black or Latino, could be turned away at the polls because they lack acceptable identification. Early voting in Texas begins Monday.

The Supreme Court's order was unsigned, as it typically is in these situations. Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan dissented, saying they would have left the district court decision in place.

The repercussions will be forthcoming.  Battleground Texas seems to have accomplished its task in adding a few hundred thousand Texans to the voter rolls.  The job now is to turn those folks out.

There will be some polling results to follow shortly, from YouGov directly and indirectly via the TexTrib/UT, perhaps as early as today or tomorrow but more likely Monday.  Unless they show some tightening of the races at the top of the ballot, I can't predict anything but a result that is woefully similar to 2002 and 2006 and 2010.  Harris County Democrats will be grinding out the GOTV efforts to hold onto their seats at the courthouse... and perhaps flip the DA and the County Clerk.

The EVBB for me begins Tuesday; at that time I'll go dark with respect to election commentary on the statewide and county ballot.  I hope to have everything I need to say said by then anyway. I will still be blogging here about politics -- probably have something on that pig castrator from Iowa, along with other US Senate developments -- but I'll take the edge off to remain in compliance with my oath as an election judge.  Same goes for Twitter and Facebook postings.  We'll mellow out with a little pumpkin spice whatever for a few weeks.

May blog about the World Series.  My buddy Gadfly's Cardinals got excused; I was hoping for a full orange and black Fall Classic myself.  That is, after the Angels and Dodgers got eliminated.

-- Greg Abbott's Twitter town hall yesterday blew up in his face, and it was, as Hair Balls accounts, laugh-out-loud hilarious.  Be sure and click on the #AskAbbott hashtag.

-- Wendy Davis lost the Dallas News endorsement but earned the Houston Chronicle's.  These simply don't mean as much as they used to, but let's be quick to point out that we still need newspapers badly in this underinformed and misled media environment.  Oh, and you can't paper-train a puppy with a blog.

Update: Some of my blog hermanos took exception to the DMN's endorsement of Abbott.  It takes a lot to drive Charles to scatological descriptions.  But I thought the Observer had the best takedown.

Elect Davis, and GOPers will be so mad they won’t cooperate on anything, just like what happened when Barack Obama took office. This is a really beautiful encapsulation of some of the most depressing features of American politics right now—a reminder that we do government primarily these days by hostage-taking, in contravention of the ostensible norms of representative government. It’s also an assertion that the hostage-takers should win, and a demonstration of why they will keep winning. It’s monumentally demoralizing. But applied to the Texas context, is it right?

What would a Gov. Davis look like? Well, she would probably have little influence over the Legislature. Assume Davis wins and so does Patrick—Davis would be able to get hardly any of her legislative priorities through. Patrick would be preparing to run against her in 2018, and his Senate would kill or mangle almost anything that bore her personal stamp. But Davis would have a veto which would prevent Patrick’s worst bills and initiatives from getting through.

But the Morning News endorsement anticipates something worse—that the conservative Legislature seizes the levers of state government and goes to war against Davis, refuses to budge on any issue, refuses to put together a budget, refuses to consider new and important legislation, until its demands are met and Davis effectively surrenders. In effect, if the people of the state elect Davis to lead them, conservatives in the Legislature—probably led by Patrick—will take Texas hostage.

So the Morning News’ instinct is to reward the hostage-taker, pay the ransom, and keep the state safely gripped by one-party rule. On the one hand, it feels like a pretty bleak misperception of how small-r republican government is supposed to work. It’s especially odd because the endorsement urges Abbott to be “a moderating influence” for his party—a bit like a liberal urging his radical-left friends to “work inside the system.”